


No Self Esteem and Vertigo

by Laurasauras



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Cheating, Drinking, Drunk Sex, Hand Jobs, M/M, The Homestuck Epilogues: Candy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:54:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27817852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laurasauras/pseuds/Laurasauras
Summary: The night before his wedding, Dave has a lacklustre bachelor party. It's hard. Being an adult and facing more years like the ones you've been having. They don't mean for anything to happen.
Relationships: John Egbert/Dave Strider
Comments: 15
Kudos: 46





	No Self Esteem and Vertigo

**Author's Note:**

  * For [swordguy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swordguy/gifts).



> Title taken from Candy - Robbie Williams. Not canon compliant in that this definitely didn't happen, but it does fit into what is canon, if that makes sense. Thanks to Max for inspiring me!

You don’t think this is what a bachelor party is supposed to look like. But what would you know? You never had one.

There’s this movie that Jake showed you one time called _The Hangover_ and it’s about a bachelor party. A guy and his best friends go to Las Vegas and they accidentally take a drug that makes them forget the night they had and then they have to figure out what happened so that they can find out where the groom is because he’s missing. And they got up to a lot of wacky hi jinks and Mike Tyson was there. It’s a pretty awesome movie. Maybe you should have brought it. It’d be better than what you’re doing.

‘Should I have brought _The Hangover_ for us to watch?’ you ask Dave.

Dave lifts his head off the carpet to look at you. You can’t see his eyes, but you don’t really need to. He thinks you’re being dumb, which you are, but at least _you_ said something. You don’t know when Dave got so quiet. It’s probably because he has to be sneaky as a resistance fighter, or maybe he just grew up somewhere along the line when you weren’t looking. His head thunks down again on the carpet.

‘No, John, you shouldn’t have brought _The Hangover.’_ he says. ‘Oh my god, I actually can’t think of anything sadder than two dudes sitting alone in a hotel room watching a movie of an actual group of friends going on an actual bachelor party based on the antiquated values from a dead world that told us that getting married was the end of our freedom so we’d better fuckin’ lock an Asian dude in the boot of a car while we still can. Firstly, Jade would love to kidnap an Asian dude with me, or any other kind of dude, she’s ride or die and I’m a lucky motherfucker to be strapping on that ball and chain for that and many other reasons. Secondly, yeah, fuck the notion that she’d stop me from any of the shenanigans in that movie even if she wasn’t to be included for some inconceivable and probably sexist reason. Thirdly, ignore how shitty those ideas were because we’d still be watching and laughing, just maybe in a kind of guilty way because of the aforementioned shitty ideas, I don’t know how well it’s aged but I can’t imagine it’s pulling a Meryl Streep, and ain’t that pathetic, that we’d be pining for a bachelor party while on a bachelor party, no, I’m really, _really_ fucking glad you did not bring _The Hangover.’_

‘Can it really get sadder than this?’ you ask. ‘I’m kind of doing that pining thing anyway and I don’t even get to watch a movie while I do it.’

Dave stands up so fast you don’t see him do it, which he doesn’t really do so much anymore. You stay where you are, sprawled over one of the twin beds in your room. You watch as he paces from one end of the room to the other and back, and back. It’s not a big room. He said it was more inconspicuous, more frugal, that you’d have fun together no matter where you were. You have the shitty thought that you’d probably be having the same amount of fun if you had chosen a bigger room.

You can’t go out anywhere because Dave’s in the resistance and you would rather die than be photographed lately. You keep telling yourself that you’ll like the way you look again some day. When you eat healthy again, maybe walk around a bit. It’ll happen. You’re pretty sure you thought you were reasonably attractive once. Where you are now is definitely a low point, anyway.

‘You didn’t even bring booze,’ Dave says suddenly.

‘I thought Rose would be here,’ you say defensively.

‘She’s busy.’

‘It’s your bachelor party!’

‘It’s a war, we’re lucky she can make it to the wedding.’

You don’t reply. You want to say something mean about Rose, but he’d hate that. You want to apologise for fucking up, but you think it’d come out angry, or maybe even teary, and he’d hate that. You glare at the ceiling.

‘I’m going to go get some,’ Dave says, decaptchaloguing his jacket on. ‘Look up some drinking games or something.’

‘Don’t get champagne, it makes me all burpy,’ you tell him.

‘I really wasn’t going to get champagne,’ he says.

He leaves. You sigh heavily and look through your sylladex. There’s a photo of you with Roxy and Harry Anderson when Harry was first born. There’s your old wedding ring. There’s a half-full bag of salt and vinegar chips, which you don’t even like. You squint at a card for a minute before realising that’s where you store all your receipts. Your TV remote that you thought you’d lost. A pack of playing cards, okay, that actually is somewhat useful. A hat. Your phone.

You pull your phone out and look up drinking games that involve cards. You choose the first one you see and put your phone away, taking out the cards instead. You don’t want Dave to come back and find you texting someone else. You zone out as you shuffle the cards. You startle when Dave opens the door again.

‘Johnnie for Johnnie,’ he drawls, throwing a bottle to you. You drop the cards clumsily to catch it. He has a second bottle and he’s spinning it in his hand. 

‘There’s two of us,’ you say. 

‘Yeah, well, I didn’t want your cooties,’ he says. ‘What are we playing, 52 pick up? I didn’t know we could drink to that.’

‘Higher/lower,’ you say. 

‘I don’t want to play something with a lot of rules.’

You pick up the cards and tap them against the bed to get them square. You flip one over. It’s a five.

‘Higher or lower?’ you ask.

‘Than what?’

You don’t answer. Dave slumps against the wall and groans. 

‘Lower,’ he says.

You flick the next card on top. Nine.

‘Drink,’ you tell him. ‘Higher or lower?’

Dave laughs weakly and unscrews the cap of his drink. He takes a sip right out of the bottle as he walks over and then sits on your bed with you. You watch him toe off his shoes, drag his trousers up his thighs, and then wrangle his legs until they’re criss-crossed. 

‘Lower,’ he says. 

‘King,’ you observe. ‘Drink.’

 _’Lower,’_ he says before you can ask. You actually laugh as you flip the card over. Two. 

He holds out his bottle to you before you can reach for your own. You meet his eyes, expecting him to tell you that you might not even get to your bottle or something, but he doesn’t say anything. You take the bottle, still looking at him. You don’t look away as he watches you drink.

‘Higher,’ he says. You laugh once, quietly. He’s pretty much guaranteed this one, but your hands are full. You lift the one holding the deck up a bit and he takes the top card from you. It’s an ace.

‘Ha!’ you say. You flush a little, embarrassed by your outburst.

‘No way!’ Dave says. ‘That’s the highest card, everyone knows that!’

‘Highest _or_ lowest, Dave,’ you say. ‘And it’s always dealer’s choice. And I choose that this means one and you have to drink.’

‘This is atrocious,’ Dave says, but he takes the bottle. ‘I _need_ a drink to deal with the betrayal I’m feeling right now.’ He sips. ‘Higher.’

‘O-kay,’ you say, drawing out the syllables in sing-song like an asshole.

‘You can’t change the value of the card retroactively,’ Dave says, sitting up straighter in his outrage. ‘Egbert, do not fuck with me here. I have never drawn a sword on you but I will over this.’

You flip the card over, trying to hold back a smile and feeling it in your cheeks anyway. Six.

‘Dave, hand me the bottle, what are you waiting for,’ you say. ‘Oh my god, it’s like you don’t know how to play this game. Someone in a _coma_ could play this game.’

‘You are lucky I don’t shove this in your bad part of town,’ he says, pushing the bottle into your hand. He can’t stop himself from smiling either.

‘Higher,’ he says. He flips a nine over for you. ‘Sorry this sucked before.’

 _‘I’m_ sorry,’ you say. You drink. ‘I am your best man, I should have planned something.’

‘Lower. No, man, I told you I had it all sorted and I don’t even know. I thought . . .’

‘Do the card, Dave,’ you say quietly.

He does. Jack. You hand him the bottle and he drinks. 

‘Adulthood fuckin’ sucks, man. If I could go back in time and tell my fifteen year old self that I would come to resent having to shave daily, he’d probably say something really dumb with a voice that randomly jumped an octave.’

‘You could do that,’ you point out. You cock your head to the side, eyeing his jaw. ‘You could also probably pull off a beard.’

‘Oh fucking hell, lower,’ he says, laughing incredulously. Queen. ‘Figures. Oh, when Rose and I play we make the queen worth more than the king. Are we playing it that way or the other way?’

‘Wow, that’s so dumb,’ you say. ‘She totally made up that rule so she could cheat at a game, didn’t she?’

‘No,’ he says. ‘She _thought_ she’d won because she and her mom played—oh, I see what happened. Yes. Yes, she did. Whatever, lower.’

‘We can play that way though, in honour of a prank that managed to last like 30 years.’

‘Fuck you. And drink.’

You glance down at the nine and smile as you do as he says.

‘So, shaving sucks,’ you say. ‘What else does?’

‘Are you kidding? Literally everything. We’re at war, the economy has tanked _specifically_ for my stock options because your _mom_ and I can’t fucking sit like this anymore because my fucking body is fucking old and it’s making everything hurt.’

He leans to the side until he can half fall off the bed and get his legs under him. He swears under his breath as he shakes them out. 

‘How are you doing that?’ he demands.

‘I sit like this to play video games, it hurts when I _don’t,’_ you say. ‘Also you’re 40, not 80, take it down a notch.’

‘I am _thirty-nine,’_ Dave insists, horrified. He tips his head back and groans. ‘Not for long though. I’m going to be a million. We’re going to live forever and our bodies are going to get fat and achy and everything will suck.’

You take a drink. He holds out his hand and you pass the bottle so he can too. You don’t really want to look at him. You think the fat thing might have been a dig at you. That’s not really like Dave, but you’re an insecure idiot and you can’t think otherwise. 

‘You have Jade,’ you say tonelessly.

‘Yeah,’ he says. He drinks again and coughs. ‘Yeah, I have Jade.’

‘Higher or lower?’ you ask.

‘Lower.’

‘Uh, nine again. I don’t know what we do for that.’

‘We both drink,’ he decides. He takes a sip, no, two mouthfuls, and hands it back to you. You drink and hold the deck up so that he can flip the card over. 

‘Lower,’ he says again, and flips. Four. You drink. ‘Higher,’ he says. Five. You drink. ‘Higher,’ he says. Ace. You hand him the bottle.

‘Um,’ you say. ‘You didn’t sound super happy about having Jade.’

‘Cold feet,’ he says dismissively. ‘Higher.’

‘This game is way too fast to be playing with scotch,’ you mutter, turning over a ten and accepting your drink. When did you start slurring? You decide to make an effort to speak more clearly. ‘We should have played poker.’

‘Fine, I’ll talk more again,’ he says. ‘Those are your options, John, you can either drink like this or you can listen to me talk. Choose carefully, one of them could kill you.’

‘Dude, I like it when you talk. Talk. I don’t think I’m saying “talk” right.’

Dave snorts. You screw the cap on the bottle and lurch to your feet. You wobble and Dave’s hand shoots out to steady you by the elbow. You blink and then open your eyes really wide. 

‘I’m going to pee,’ you declare. ‘And then you’re going to talk.’

You walk in an admirably straight line to the bathroom. You almost forget to close the door, but you remember while your fly is only half undone. You stand over the toilet, brace your forearm on the wall and aim with a lot more concentration than the activity usually requires. The bathroom is spinning a bit and you roll on the balls of your feet to compensate for the movement. You _somehow_ don’t get any pee on the floor. You even remember to wash your hands! You check your phone before you leave the bathroom and note that it’s been like forty minutes and you’ve had . . . um . . . an amount. You don’t know how much. Probably the same as Dave? Which is bullshit, because you’re dealer. It’s not actually an advantage in this game. And crap, it’s not even 11pm. 

When you get out, Dave’s pulled the dining room style chair from the desk and put it next to the bed so that he can sit like a grown up. You get back on the bed and hold your hand out for the cards. Dave gives you a low five. You give him a look. He flips a three over.

‘Higher or lower.’

‘Higher,’ you say. ‘And talk, why aren’t you talking?’

‘Aw, you know,’ he says. ‘People don’t actually like my bullshit.’

Six. He takes a drink and then looks at the bottle. He sticks out his tongue and turns it completely upside down. You watch a drop land on his chin instead of in his open mouth. You snigger. 

‘Higher,’ you say. ‘That’s not true. I like your bullshit. I _miss_ your bullshit. I’ve had it since I was nine and you were sending me fucking Neomail. Do they have Neopets on Earth C?’

‘John, don’t be the thirty-nine year old on Neopets. Don’t do that.’

He shuffles the deck unnecessarily. You don’t mind the break. You should have got you both water while you were up.

‘Look, I think I believe you. But even if that’s true, you’re the only one and we barely talk anymore.’

‘We used to Snapchat every day,’ you say, looking at your hands. 

‘For _years,’_ he agrees. ‘Every single day, our streak was insane.’

‘I don’t realise,’ you say, voice wobbly, ‘how much I miss you until we’re together.’

‘Oh god, don’t do that John.’

‘I’m not,’ you say, rubbing at your eye under your glasses clumsily. ‘I’m not. I’m _trying,_ I know, I know it’s pathetic, I know it’s—’

Okay, you are. You’re crying. You push the heels of your palms to each eye and feel your glasses fall off. Your shoulders shake a little but you stop yourself from outright sobbing. 

You feel the mattress sink and then Dave puts his arm around you. You lean into him and try to breathe deeply, to get yourself under control. 

‘Sorry,’ you whisper. ‘It’s your party.’

‘Yeah,’ he laughs. ‘Some party.’

You wipe your wet hands on your pants and wipe your eyes again. The salt from your tears kind of stings, which is bullshit, it’s come _from_ your eyes. Dave rubs his hand up and down on your shoulder. He smells good.

‘Rose isn’t busy,’ he says. ‘I mean, she is. But she’s not too busy for this. We’re in a fight.’

‘You don’t fight with Rose.’

‘Oh, I do. I don’t fight with anyone like I fight with her.’ He stops for a moment. ‘Okay, I don’t fight with anyone. But I do fight with her.’ He sighs. ‘She says it’s because I trust her to forgive me after. I think it’s just because she was there to fight with when I was pubescent and angry and then she was the only one I’d been like that with. It’s whatever.’

‘What are you fighting about?’

‘She doesn’t think I should marry Jade.’

You lift your head and sniff, wiping the backs of your hands against your eyes to get the last of the tears. He drops your shoulder so he can bend down to pick up your glasses.

‘Your eyes are just _crazy_ blue,’ he tells you before he hands them back. 

You wish he’d put his arm around you again. Your heart aches with loneliness. 

‘Why?’

‘Sburb, probably. You’ve got the platonic ideal of blue caught in your irises.’

‘No, shut up. I mean why does Rose not want you to marry Jade?’

‘Oh. She doesn’t think I love her enough.’ He stands up and you watch him speechlessly as he walks into the bathroom. He comes back a moment later and hands you a glass of water, wiping his lips like he’s just drank one himself.

‘Which is crazy, right?’ he continues. He sits next to you again. ‘We’ve been together over fifteen years. I’d die for her. Hell, I’d kill for her. I’ve loved her since I knew what love was, really. How the fuck could that not be enough? I’m, Jesus, I’m giving it all I fucking have.’

You stare at him. He runs his hand through his hair, agitated. It was styled all neat, but with him lying on the floor and moving around it’d gotten a little looser. This is the final straw and it falls in his eyes. You brush it back without thinking. He freezes.

‘Sorry,’ you murmur.

‘I,’ he says. He clears his throat. ‘I want to be enough for her and I’m scared . . . scared Rose is right.’

‘She’s not,’ you say. ‘She’s an idiot. You love so good. Well. Grammar.’

You drink a mouthful of water. You can feel Dave’s eyes on you, expecting you to continue. You don’t really know what you’re saying.

‘No one loves like you. You feel . . . like home.’

You finally meet his eyes. See, this is what you mean. He looks at you like this and you _know,_ with more certainty than you’ve ever known anything, that he loves you. You’ve seen him look at Jade like this too. At Rose. At Karkat, once. He loves with his whole heart. 

He lifts his hand and slowly takes his shades off, folds them and holds them carefully on his lap. You can’t believe he kept them all this time. Sometimes you forget that it was you who gave them to him, they’re just so much a part of him now. You’ve only seen him without them a few times. It’s been years and years. But when he looks back at you again you feel like it hasn’t been that long.

You brush his hair out of his face again. He doesn’t freeze this time, he just stares into your eyes. He looks kind of concerned. Your fingers are lingering on his jaw and you don’t know why. Until you do. You lean towards him and kiss his lips gently.

‘John,’ he mumbles when you pull back.

You put your glass on the chair he was sitting on and ignore it when it falls off and spills onto the carpet. You take his shades and put them down with more care. He watches and then meets your eyes again. You hesitate.

He’s not stopping you. Your heart is beating painfully in your chest because this is the best and worst thing you’ve ever done. You need this. You need his love, completely, just for tonight.

You kiss him again, lingering this time, easing back and then pressing close. The room moves with you when you fall back onto the bed together and he parts his lips for you. Your heart squeezes and you shiver when your tongues touch. He holds you by the shoulder as if he thinks you’re going to pull back. You’re not, you can’t, you want him so badly. And then he’s the one who moves away. 

‘I can’t,’ he says.

‘Last day of freedom,’ you whisper.

‘John, I ain’t been free since . . . _ever,_ fuck. I haven’t ever been free one single day of my life.’

‘Dave,’ you say, heart breaking for him, for you, for the ones you can’t think about right now. ‘One day of freedom, then. Do the wrong thing, just once.’

He looks agonised. His hand is still on your shoulder. His bottom lip is shiny from your kisses.

‘Please,’ you say.

He hesitates just a second longer and then he nods. You sit up, throw your glasses at the other bed and then you shift with him up the bed so that you’re on it properly. You kiss him again, and this time you’re not stopping for anything. You reach for the buttons on his shirt and fumble with them, hating whatever shot it was that made you slip into this level of incoordination. He gets the buttons you hadn’t got to yet and together you get him out of his shirt.

‘You too,’ he says as he shakes the last bit from his arm. 

You bite your lip before you pull your t-shirt off. He looks really good, and you’re the kind of guy people cluck their tongues at and say “he’s really let himself go, hasn’t he?”. But then he’s pushing you back onto the bed and stroking up your side in a way that has you glad it’s bare.

‘You’re so fucking hot,’ he groans, and his tongue is in your mouth again before you can doubt him. And you can’t, really. Dave’s painfully honest, always has been. Sarcastic, sure. But always real underneath.

He pulls at your belt and your heart squeezes again, this time with undeniable arousal. You pull at his zip with too much eagerness and hear a tear. 

‘Whoops,’ you say.

‘Christ, Egbert,’ he mutters, lips shaping the words against yours as he refuses to take even an inch of space.

You get both your pants off and come together again, and this time it happens with blissful relief and the urge to make everything happen _now._ Your hand is on his hip and his arms are around your neck and his warm skin is heaven.

‘Do you have anything?’ you ask in a whisper.

‘What, like condoms?’

‘Yeah,’ you say.

‘Didn’t think I’d need them,’ he says dryly.

‘Damn, neither,’ you say. ‘Argh, I wanted to fuck you.’

He sucks in a breath and pulls you closer.

‘Cruel,’ he moans in your ear. ‘Fuck you for putting that idea in my head.’

Your mind races to shower gel, to asking reception, to asking Dave to time travel and make this happen. He reaches down and takes you in his hand and strokes gently. Okay, that feels fucking amazing. You wrap your hand around him as well. He moves his leg between yours so his thigh is against your balls and you lean into him.

His pre wets your palm, but not enough. You take your hand back for a second and spit. He copies and the sudden slickness makes you groan. You roll so that instead of facing each other on your sides you’re on top of him and thrust into his hand, using your hip to move your hand at the same time. 

_‘Yes,’_ he whispers. 

His other hand comes down on your ass with a small slap and urges you through the movement again. You kiss him as you thrust, slow at first, but once you get more spit involved you get faster, messier. You kiss him and fuck his hand and imagine it’s his ass that’s holding you, meeting your movements and making them better. 

‘Dave,’ you moan. He makes a helpless, whimpery noise. ‘Dave,’ you repeat, and his fingers dig into your ass. ‘Oh _fuck,_ so _good.’_

_‘John.’_

You both spit again when it starts wearing thin and then Dave rolls on top when your thrusts weaken. You’re so close . . . but it’s not happening. Dave leans his forehead into your chest and swears. He stops moving and lets his weight fall onto you. He’s heavier than he looks.

 _’Fucking_ whisky dick.’

You groan, frustrated. He makes a broken sound that approximates a laugh.

‘I cheated on my fiancee and I didn’t even come,’ he says.

He rolls off you and off the bed. His erection taunts you, even once he’s pulled his underwear back over the top of it.

‘We could try sucking each other off?’ you suggest.

‘I don’t know about you, but I’ve been here before. Do you think that’ll really work?’

‘It’d feel good,’ you say, but you know he’s right. You don’t even really feel the urge now that you’ve stopped, just dissatisfaction that’ll probably last till you fall asleep.

‘I can’t believe I did that,’ he says. ‘I can’t believe I did that. I need a shower.’ You sit up, frowning at the speed at which he’s changed gears. ‘Please, don’t be naked when I get out,’ he says quietly, not looking at you. He enters the bathroom and you hear the lock click.

You fall onto your back and look to the bedside table, to where the alarm clock tells you it’s midnight. You cover your face with your hands. Dave is getting married in less than 18 hours. To your sister. 

You don’t want him to. 

It’s not _fair._ You’re so alone.

You pretend to be asleep when Dave gets out of the shower, much, much later. You listen to him picking up his clothes and getting into his own bed. You hear the familiar gentle clack of your glasses hitting a bedside table.

‘Night, John,’ he whispers.

You stop pretending to be asleep. You can’t leave him hanging.

‘Night, Dave,’ you whisper back.

You are so alone.


End file.
